Introduction of the Bologna Process in Poland

In June 2009, the Polish Ministry of Education started the process of so-called “social consultations” about the proposed changes to the law which would introduce most of the reforms required in the framework of the Bologna Process. As usual, the government's proposals are shrouded in secrecy and hardly anyone in society knows anything about those "social consultations" (certainly not the students themselves). The only exception - of course – are business lobbyinsts, who are always well informed about any upcoming changes in the laws. The laws are scheduled to enter into effect by October 1st 2010.

In a 80 page document, the Ministry of Education describes the ideological foundations on which the Bologna Process is based. It reads as follows: “The policy of the state towards the universities should be to prepare an elite of managers who would be in charge of the universities. They need to take control of the enterprise that is called the university. This enterprise produces human capital. This new model of management is not always to be reconciled with democracy! Democracy is based on academic merit and the experience of the past. But now, we need universities that are ruled with vision and the ability to look into the future". This, supposedly, can't work in a democratic way.

In a typically Orwellian way, the liquidation of the autonomy of the universities and putting them under the control of the market and businessmen is called "increasing the autonomy of the universities". The deregulation of teaching curriculums and the removal of quality standards is being called "care about quality". It's also interesting to see how in the words of the ministry, the process is "the fulfillment of the aspirations of the society”, when in reality it is only the fulfillment of the aspirations of the business class who need workers qualified in narrow fields and access to knowledge produced on the universities in order to privatize and commercialize it for their own benefit.

The Ministry of Educations claims that currently there are too many students on pedagogical and social studies (more than 30%) and not enough on technical and scientific studies. What's more, the ministry complains that "the universities do not care about the needs of the industry".

Universities, and even each faculty within the universities, are to become “companies” that generate profits, controlled by managers, participating in the “competition for grants culture", and the costs of education are to be moved to students, by replacing free tuition by student credits – very lucrative for banks.

Some of the proposed measures include: creating an elite of universities that would have priority for any money from Polish government or EU money, based on their compliance with the Bologna restructuring plan, inclusion of representatives nominated by the employer’s organizations in academic councils that are to be mandatory for certain types of universities, that are to make sure the universities are “in harmony with the economic surroundings”. Employers will gain the possibility to determine the study programs and the academic personnel will be degraded to temporary precarious working staff, whose contracts will have to be renewed on a regular basis and who can be fired whenever convenient.

Original document from the Ministry of Education about the planned reforms (in Polish): https://cia.media.pl/files/20091030_EEE_zalozenia_po_RM.pdf